


The Anatomy of a Fall

by LadyMerlin



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: 2013, All the Loki Feels, Big Bang, Eventually Optimistic Loki, Existential Angst, Freefall, Gen, Get Your Shit Together Asgard, God Damn It What's Wrong With You Asgardians Seriously, Loki Does What He Wants Then Faces The Consequences, Odin's A+ Parenting, Physics, Poor Loki, Suicidal Loki, The 5 Stages of Grief, The Kübler-Ross Model of Grief, author attempts SCIENCE!, gravity - Freeform, villainbigbang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-24
Updated: 2013-08-24
Packaged: 2017-12-24 12:36:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/940087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyMerlin/pseuds/LadyMerlin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki learns what it means to fall from grace, and what it feels like to truly have nothing left to lose. There are reasons for everything he does; he is not a mindless beast who acts on only instinct. He is a creature of logic, and rationality. Still, he does not know why he tried so hard to fit in. In hindsight, he was a fool to have bet his entire self-worth on figuring out what he was doing wrong, when the truth was that it really wasn't him, this time.</p><p>The five stages of the Kübler-Ross model of grief, mapped neatly on to the physical and scientific description of free-fall.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Anatomy of a Fall

**Author's Note:**

> This is crossposted to LJ on both the villainbang LJ and my personal LJ (Obsessionality), here: http://obsessionality.livejournal.com/113504.html
> 
> The artist for this fic is Kymericl on LJ, and the art master-post is here: http://kymericl.livejournal.com/37777.html
> 
> I'd say sorry for the fandom references, but I'm not sorry at all. Have fun picking them out!

The Anatomy of a Fall

Free-fall can be poetically (unscientifically) described as a rapid, uncontrollable decline.

 

Loki had once laughed at the whimsy of such imprecise words. Of all the beings in the nine realms, he knew best that words were fickle and easily manipulated; hardly accurate when there were seiðr and mathematics and physics to better give solid form to concepts. He had been accused of lacking a soul for criticizing the great poets of Asgard, and for scoffing at the most famous storytellers in the realm. But he didn’t lack appreciation for poetry and prose. Not at all. As a matter of fact, as the God of Lies, he fully approved of prose, poetry, and of the use of words to create images and give shape to ideas and thoughts. There was no better twister of words than Loki. He was, after all, the Father of Lies.

 

What people failed to appreciate was that all words were lies. No two people understood words in the same way. When he had chosen the moniker, none but his fath- _Odin_ had understood that every word anyone ever spoke was a lie, and in that he was the Father of Words. Even Frigga had not realized. He was the master of words, and Loki was not willing to be ashamed of that. It was only because of his mastery that he knew just how flimsy words could be. And that was why he had laughed at the poetic descriptions of free-fall, amongst other things.

 

Free-fall was indeed a rapid, uncontrollable decline – he would not deny the truth in that. However, it was more accurately the movement of a body when the only force acting on it was gravity. That definition of free-fall was far more precise, and worked for almost every object, in almost every realm. It tied in with other concepts that also applied in almost every realm, which could be carefully measured and recreated time and time again, regardless of the words and terms used to describe them. Loki called these absolute truths, and rare as they were, he liked them.

 

(When he’d been younger, he’d wondered for years why birds were exempt from gravity, and no one had been able to explain it to him; everyone else had been more interested in shooting birds out of the sky than in figuring out what kept them up. Hugin and Munin had sat patiently while he examined them for some extra magical body-part that gave them the power to evade the one constant he could think of. He’d wanted to figure out what body part it was, so he could get one -- he’d have begged, borrowed or stolen --  so he too, could be suspended off the ground. This was before he’d understood the physics and mathematics of aerodynamics.)

 

_“Loki, why do you keep jumping off that tree? You break your bones every time!”_

_“I want to learn how to fly, Brother. This is how baby birds do it.”_

_“Loki, don’t be foolish! You belong on the ground, beside me! We will fight like men – we have no need for flight!”_

 

For someone who enjoyed the title of the God of Lies and Mischief, Loki had a surprisingly soft spot for the foolishness of honesty and truth. He appreciated the absence of lies as something that could be easily relied on to exist, and then ignored. But he also knew that good men were few and far apart, and he was better off specializing in dishonesty and lies.

 

_I do actually tell the truth sometimes. Yet people are always surprised._

 

But when Loki fell (because he _fell_ , and there was no two-ways about it, no way he can play it as flying or floating) he realized that while his absolute truth remained just that: an objective analysis and calculation was insufficient to describe what it actually _meant_ to fall freely.

 

A free-fall was a rapid, uncontrollable decline.

 

_I could have done it, Father._

 

And even though free-fall didn’t last forever, succumbing to air resistance and friction and eventually reaching terminal velocity, before finally impacting, that moment of pure free-fall, however short it was, was much more complicated than a mere rapid and uncontrollable decline.

 

_For You._

 

 

  
**Gravity** (denial)

Loki had many flaws, but a lack of self-awareness had never been one of them. He had always known that he was different, even if he had not known exactly why. After the first few years of completely failing to understand what he was doing wrong, he had consciously taken his self-awareness, and his analytical mind, and had done his very best to figure out exactly what it was about himself that made Odin-his _father_ -hate him.

 

_No, Loki._

 

He had not been very successful, but as every mage and philosopher knew, very few important experiments were immediately successful. To succeed, he knew, one must have failed several times. But the stakes in this game were high, and he was very involved in the outcome of this experiment. Neither of these factors was conducive to the scientific method, or the objectiveness of the experiment. There was nothing to be done about it, though. The answer was important, and his failure to understand stung like salt in an open wound.

 

_Not good enough, Loki. Try again._

 

Throughout the entire process of trial and error, throughout the majority of his youth, his self-awareness had kept the knowledge of his failure at the forefront of his mind. He was lacking, and he was so grotesquely lacking that he did not even understand what it was he did not have. His primary conclusion had been that he had to have been missing something fundamental, because he didn’t feel like he was missing anything. But he clearly was. It was the one thing he could be sure of. That he was lacking – it was an absolute truth, and it gave Loki the strength to keep going. He just had to figure it out. Somehow. Loki was good at figuring things out. It was one of the only things he was good at, that anyone cared about. If he failed to solve this problem, he would have failed in some greater way than just that.

 

He’d have failed to be good at anything, and he wasn’t sure his self-worth could take that.

 

_Again, Loki._

 

When events had come to a head, there had been multiple factors which affected the outcome. On one hand, he was missing the thing which would have made his father love him. On the other hand, he was unable to figure out what he was missing. On the third ~~hand~~ limb (because this was a job for Fenrir, or Sleipnir, or both) he was only good at finding things out, but on the forth limb, he obviously wasn’t good enough. And wasn’t that just the headline of his entire life? He wasn’t good _enough_.)

 

_You need to be more like your brother, Loki._

 

He was pretty sure that his turning out to be Jötunn made up for the remaining limbs of all his children combined. Possibly more. He’s aware that his thoughts are nonsensical, but he’s a mad god, and he’s surely entitled.

 

When he lets go of Gungnir (he is self-aware enough to not lie to himself; not about this, not when nobody is listening), he finds that he has some time to think. He has an eternity to think.

 

He is absurdly calm about everything that has happened in the run up to the fall. He would not have expected it from himself. He had been expecting more rage, and upset, and hurt. But he is possibly beyond hurt, beyond rage, beyond emotion. He has possible reached the point at which he is no longer concerned about his destination, because he has hit rock bottom and nothing can possibly get worse.

 

_Don’t curse us, Loki._

_Don’t be foolish, Brother. I’d be able to undo any curse you want._

 

It’s practically a challenge to the universe at this point, but he does not care over much. Freedom is just another term for having nothing left to lose. Loki has more freedom than most. He doubts whether he had anything to start with, but he does not much want to consider questions to which he will not like the answers to. He is content to limit himself to not caring about _them_ , and by extension, about himself. He is friendless, without a soul in the world to care about his wellbeing (except his darling children, but they have more pressing concerns). It should hurt, but he is no longer surprised. It hardly matters. It never mattered. He was always going to fail.

 

Everything in his life till that point had set him up to fail. It all made sense, in hindsight.

 

He had never believed in Ragnarok, but if Ragnarok was real, then it would have been written that he would not believe in it. Somehow, it brings comfort to know that nothing he could have done would have changed the way this (his life) had panned out. It’s also very discomforting, but he’ll take the positives where he can get them. He’s a realist, but he’s also falling through time and space and alternate realms, so it’s not like it could hurt him.

 

He thinks about many things, but mostly about falling from grace, if he ever had it, to begin with; he doubts it. In the beginning, he thinks mostly about falling, and about gravity. On Asgard, it is said that things stay rooted to the ground because of divine will. That had never been enough of an explanation for Loki. It had been a small enough thing to let this bit of foolishness pass, if he could live to fight another day; if he could live another day to understand what he had done wrong. It is a small enough price to pay, to not ask a question he would eventually have been able to answer himself. Loki had always known to pick his battles.

 

 _“Don’t walk away from me, Loki! Stand, and_ fight _like a man!”_

_“Brother, I do not need to fight with you to survive. Nor do I see why I should strive to be a man, if it would make me like you.”_

 

He very carefully does not think about the fact that he will likely not survive this. If he is not going to survive it, and he knows this for a fact, then he need not worry about it, because it is ineffable. Odin’s will is ineffable, and even though Loki is the god of Chaos, he cannot thwart ineffability. He used to think he could, and this is where he has ended up.

 

  
**Free-fall** (anger)

And then, he rages. He rages against everything. Against Thor, against Odin, against the thrice-cursed Warriors-Three and the thrice-damned Sif.

 

_He’s always been jealous of Thor._

 

The rages against the accursed _and_ damned Jötunns, against Heimdall, against the Bifrost, against Laufey.

 

_Blood will always hold out, Loki. You will always be a son of the Jötnar._

_(We will kill_ all _the_ accursed _Jötunn Monsters!)_

 

Most of all, Loki raged against himself. He is the root of all evil. He is the stem of all problems. If he hadn’t been born, if he had died as a defenseless babe, perhaps things would have been better. Easier, certainly. He cannot die now. He cannot let himself die, and he is too strong to be killed by any fool. Odin will have to put him down if he wants to bring an end to the era of Loki. Odin is a fool, sentimental enough about things and weapons for Loki to not worry too much that Odin might no longer (might never have) see him as a son.

 

_Why did you take me?_

 

Loki had always been more pragmatic than those in his family. Thor had refused to throw away his childhood toys; he kept them in a dusty cupboard, but would not let anyone touch them, or use them, or throw them away.

 

Frigga had gifts from distant relatives and past suitors whom she _hated_ , but she kept them anyway. She had kept books whether she read them or not, whether she agreed with them or not. They sat unused, and unseen in a private library. Perhaps it was the privilege of wealth, but Loki had always seen it as a waste, hiding all those old things away.

 

Odin had entire dungeons full of weapons he did not, or could not use. He did not melt down the old weapons for new, he did not repair the broken ones so they could be used, and he did not give away the older ones for others to use.

 

Loki was a weapon, and a play thing, and a memento of a war Odin had won, even if he was not Odin’s son. There was no chance that Odin would destroy him, even if Loki was blunted and useless, and Odin hated him.

 

He rages against his own pride. If he was a more humble man, he would have ended himself hundreds of years ago. He would have put himself (and every other Aesir in Asgard, and possibly all the Jötunns in Jotunheim) out of his own misery. If he was a humble man, there would not have been so many problems to start with; it was his pride that stung at being ignored for so many years, and underestimated. His pride had become his downfall. He never had pretended to be perfect. But his flaws are hardly of his own creation.

 

Loki is now too powerful to be destroyed. It’s ironic, and in another universe, Loki would have laughed. Now, it’s just another flaw.

 

What bothers Loki the most is that by his own sentiment, Odin has damned himself, and he has damned Loki. They are too far past the stage of entertaining thoughts of destroying Loki. Odin created an Asgardian Prince from a Jötunn Prince. He created a monster, and his is not capable of destroying it. Neither is Loki, anymore.

 

_“You are my son, Loki.”_

_“Tell me the_ **truth** _!”_

 

He is a fool to have cared so much about what Thor, Odin and Frigga thought of him. He was (is?) a smart man. He had been entirely capable of seeing at first glance that they didn’t think much of him, and that they never would. A smarter man would have left well enough alone. But Loki had cared about what his “father” and “brother” and “mother” thought.

 

Caring is not an advantage. He knows this, yet he had cared enough to rend himself, limb from limb, contorting and twisting into obscene shapes to try to _understand_. And all for naught. Odin had _known_ that he was fundamentally different; that he would never fit in. And he had never told Loki. He hadn’t thought it pertinent, to tell the stolen relic, that he had a _purpose_ , which he did not yet understand. That he was not in fact, broken, or _useless_ , but merely meant for a different purpose. And if that purpose was death, or sacrifice, and Loki had been told that that was all he had been meant to be, perhaps he would have been happier. Perhaps he wouldn’t have cared so much about matching anyone else (matching _Thor_ ), if he had known that he wasn’t meant to.

 

Loki would have liked to have known that he was nothing but Thor’s tool for a victorious Asgard, and that even though he would have been invaluable to the cause, he would never be Thor’s equal.

 

_I love you, Brother._

 

Maybe it would have hurt less, if he’d known they wouldn’t love a monster, no matter what he pretended to be.

 

_Brother, no._

 

But as things stood, Loki had strived for an impossible ideal. He remembered Frigga tucking him and Thor into their beds in the old nursery, and telling them stories of the horrific monsters that lived on frozen Jotunheim. She’d told them the stories of the Great War between Laufey and Odin, and how Laufey and his people had been evil and deprived. She’d told them how they ate raw flesh, and lived unclothed like animals in the wild. She’d told them the stories every other child their age had been told; cautionary and horrific. Thor had wanted nothing more than to go out there and fight the Jötunn. Loki had had nightmares for years, of a blue giant reaching into his nursery and eating him alive.

 

_Loki, hush, hush darling boy. It’s just a bad dream. The All-father will keep you_

safe _.”_

 

Frigga had not once flinched, when he’d gone to her after his nightmares. She’d just told him that he was safe, and that Odin had killed any Jötunn who might dare harm him. He didn’t understand how she had failed to foresee that he would one day find out. As his mother, who knew him best, Frigga _should_ have known that finding out would destroy him. Frigga, who was a _seer_ , should have known better than to plant seeds of self-hatred in the younger prince.

 

_We will raze Jotunheim to the ground, Thor! For Father! So those monsters can never touch us again!_

 

Perhaps she had known from the beginning that he would love her most in all of Asgard, and that he would rely on her affection and support to keep himself alive. Perhaps, she had known that when he found out, all she would have to do was withhold her affection, effectively depriving him of half his heart and most of his soul. Perhaps, she had given him love so that, when the time came, she could cripple him, where Odin could not.

 

_Boy, your mother is wiser than my entire council put together. Don’t ever doubt that your mother knows exactly what she is doing._

 

The thought that she had lied to him, and told him that she loved him when she did not, would have been enough to send him to his knees, if he had not already been falling.

 

 

  
**Terminal Velocity** (bargaining)

When he has run out of anger, and pain, and hurt, when he is beyond emotion, he thinks. He feels empty, and clean, like a chalice finally run dry of poison. He feels like it has all been bled from his veins. He is still falling, and the Norns only know when it will stop. He is far from happy, but he is balanced. He is not at peace, but in his own mind, he is still. Not the stillness that comes before a storm, rather it is one that comes after, when the floodwaters have washed everything away, with every surface left clean, wounds left open, and uninfected.

 

It is far from healthy, and he is not well, but at least he is capable of recognizing it. He can’t remember the last time he was this still, or clear-headed. Asgard was not a realm conducive to peace. Long lived as they are, the Aesir were not inclined to functions like thinking, or reflecting, preferring to engage in non-stop physical activity. Loki hadn’t much enjoyed it.

 

He’d hardly had a chance to spend some time on his own, reading or studying in the library. All too often, Thor would burst in, insisting that Loki accompany him in foolhardy pursuits. He’d want to throw himself off trees, or buildings, or mountains, or on one memorable occasion, a giant flying eagle over Muspelheim.

 

_“Come, Brother! Let us go on a quest!”_

_“Thor, I’m busy, I’ve just read how—”_

_“Loki, your books will be here when you return! Father has told me a story, and now we must go forth on an adventure!”_

 

If Thor hadn’t interrupted him, Frigga would have. She had openly relied on his knowledge of spell-casting and seiðr. She had appreciated his insight on her potion-making, or her gardening. He had not been welcomed to the women’s circles he had frequented, with his mother, but few would have refused the beloved queen. She had contributed to the courts’ perception of him as overly feminine, be at that time he hadn’t thought it was intentional. He had enjoyed his time with his mother, and had relied on the fact that he was Odin’s _son_ , to protect him from any harsh words or criticisms.

 

_“Loki, my darling, words will never hurt you. They can say what they want, but you are a Prince of Asgard.”_

_“Loki Odinson.”_

 

If he had spent more than two hours in peace, without being interrupted, Odin would have stepped in. Odin had always had an objection to him spending time alone, in the library. He had claimed time and time again that it was not a Prince’s duty to be bound in books, and that it would not help him in the running for Kinghood. When Loki was very young, he had said that he didn’t want to be King, because that was Thor’s job. Odin had been so furious, that Loki had never said it again. Loki had assured Thor, in private, that he did not want to be King, and Thor had accepted it. But Odin had not, and refused to let him “waste” his time in the womanly arts when it could be better spent in learning to fight. Like Thor. Till today, he didn’t understand Odin’s rage at being told that his only son would not face any opposition in claiming the throne.

 

_“What am I?!”_

_“You are my son.”_

_“Tell me the_ **truth** _!”_

 

Even as he had been the first port of call when someone needed help, he had been shunned and humiliated for his love of learning. No one had supported him; not even those whose lives he had saved. They had felt that even siding with Loki would taint their name and their image. Being helped by Loki became a taboo, and no one admitted to having asked him for anything. He had received so many midnight visits that there had often been a line at his door, and him answering it in his night clothes. It would have been more than a little insulting if he had not been used to it.

 

_“Madam, I need no payment. You are father’s friend. It was a pleasure to be able to—”_

_“We have heard the same tales, Odinson. I would not have my family beholden to you. Take the payment.”_

 

In another universe he would have reveled in it, that they feared him so. He would have found it the sweetest reward, that they flinched from his glance, and that they cowered into corners when he walked past. He would have luxuriated in the sound of crowds parting for him and whispers falling silent as news of his arrival spread like wildfire. He would have thrilled in the sensation of being a god among gods, with the whole world small and shining in the palm of his hands.

 

_Kneel!_

_In the end, you will always kneel!_

 

In this universe, he could not remember the last time someone had touched him. He could not remember the last time he had made decent, prolonged eye-contact with anyone. He could not remember what it felt like to be welcomed (into a room, a conversation, a relationship). He was used to it. But he dreamt of feeling safe, and secure, with someone to back him up. He dreamt of casual touch, and smiles and belonging. Waking up from those dreams always hurt.

 

Even though he hated the fear, he understood it, and on some level, even appreciated it. Prey always knew when a predator was near, even if the predator was in disguise. Loki was the predator; the wolf in sheep's clothing.

 

_“Always listen to your instincts. If you sense danger, there is no shame in running, so you may fight another day.”_

_“Why don’t you tell Thor that, Mother?”_

_“Because you have always been more sensible than your older Brother, my dear boy.”_

 

He is the thing that made the hair on the back of Sif’s neck rise, without having ever touched her, or any of them. He understands how they were never at ease with him, because instincts are always reliable. They only felt around him, what he felt around each and every single one of them.

 

_“He hides from them, Odin. He hides from Thor and his friends. They hurt him because he is different.”_

_“Frigga, he will learn. He must. If he is to take over this realm one day, Loki will learn to stand and face his fears.”_

_“All-Father, I do not think he is afraid. I think he does not care anymore. They have damaged him.”_

_“He is young, love. He will recover. He will grow into his mantle. Everyone knows that he is the smarter one. Thor will need him. Even he knows that.”_

_“Does he?”_

 

He had not been cognizant of the Allfather’s plan for him. He was not sure what purpose he would have eventually served. He was not sure how many people had known of it, who had done nothing but laugh at his discomfort from the side-lines. He did not care. He simply knew that not one of them had had the sympathy to _tell_ him that he wasn’t wanted, and put him out of his misery.

 

 _He has always been jealous of Thor_.

 

Had _Thor_ known? Had he known all along? That would be a greater betrayal than even Loki can stomach, given the times he had laid down his life at Thor’s feet. He cannot consider it, yet.

 

_You look like a King._

 

He could've done everyone a favour by leaving the realm, but no one had been kind enough to tell him what he’d been aching to hear.

 

_I love you, Brother._

 

No, he had let go of the Bifrost himself, with his captors protesting their innocence till the last breath. He knew how he would be remembered: the false prince; the trickster who lied so much that he ended up lying to himself. It would be a cautionary tale, he thinks, about the coward prince who hadn’t been able to stomach his own betrayal, in the face of Odin’s wrath.

 

_No, Loki._

 

  
**Impact** (depression)

When he landed, he could have saved himself. He could have softened the fall. He could have floated to the ground as gently as a feather, and landed with nary a scratch on his body.

 

He let himself crash onto the surface of the realm with all the impact the fall deserved; a fitting conclusion to a lengthy period of momentum, and anticipation. He did not know where he was. He hardly cared. Perhaps the crash would have knocked some sense into him. Perhaps he would be able to feel it, unlike everything else he had neither felt nor experienced, in the past eons. He did not know how long he had fallen. He did not care. He waited for nothingness and numbness, because for the first time, he did not want to think anymore. He did not care that thinking was the only thing he was good at; he simply wanted to block out everything, and not think, or feel, or exist.

 

Of course, he was not allowed such an easy escape. Every bone in his body hurt. Every muscle was aching from the prolonged exposure to the space between planets and realms, from the pressure and the inescapable cold. His eyes burned from the atmosphere of wherever he was, the chemicals and gases in the air, and yet he did not have the control enough to blink and spare his eyes from the brightness. He could not move as much as a muscle, let alone move to find shelter to recover. Even though he knew instinctively that he would not die from his injuries, lying there would only lengthen the process of healing, dragging out the pain. He wasn’t masochistic, but he had nowhere else to go. Lying here with his body in pain would at least distract him from the pain he would suffer inside, after he healed. He possibly deserved it.

 

And still, he longed for oblivion. He prayed, but he was not sure to whom, because to some he was a God, but he did not believe in gods himself. He was not sure what he was praying for either, when there was no purpose, no goal, no end in sight. He prayed anyway. And then he drifted, and perhaps it was a higher being answering his prayers.

 

_“They say the Norns visit you in your dreams, sometimes.”_

_“Ah, Sif, still so lady-like and delicate, with your fantasies and dreams…_ Ouch _!”_

_“One would have thought you would know better than to taunt Lady Sif, Volstagg.”_

_“One would have thought that wise warriors such as yourself would know better, than to tempt the Norns…”_

_“Loki, stop trying to scare us. There’s no such thing!”_

 

He dreamt of Asgard, but he was aware even in his unconscious state, that it was not real. Frigga and Odin had never smiled at him like that. Thor had never included him as anything more than an afterthought. Sif and the Warriors Three had never looked pleased to see him. Women had never presented their children to him, asking for his favour and his blessings. Idly, waiting for this waking nightmare to pass, he wondered what they thought he would have done to their children. He has children of his own, and it matters not that they do not look like him or Angrboda. He likes children, and yet he was the monster their mothers used to make them behave. Possibly that had hurt more than anything else, more than even the falling and the landing and the waiting. In his dream, he sat in a corner of Frigga’s garden, closed his eyes, and waited for the falsehood to pass.

 

_When you are weary, and feeling sapped of your strength, you must go to Idunn and ask for a golden apple._

 

He dreamt of his children. He dreamt of a memory. He is watching from a distance as his darling babies gambol and play, Jörmungandr twining around Sleipnir’s yet-awkward legs (as Loki remembers them – Sleipnir will have grown and Loki had no idea what he would look like, or whether he would remember his mother, and this too, was agony), and Hel drawing something with Fenrir snapping at her fluttering scarf. Angrboda is keeping careful watch on them, treating Sleipnir like her own, and smiling at him standing in the distance. In his memories, he knows that she is not a bubbly creature, somber and serious and intent, but she loves him and she loves them, and she need not smile or say it to prove it. It is a happy memory and he was sad when it passed. He grasped at it like Hel’s scarf, but it was slippery like silk, and the tendrils of the dream slipped through his grasp, and then he was on Jotunheim.

 

On Jotunheim, his world came down around his ears. He saw himself, younger, more naïve, more trusting, yet still himself, wide eyed and tousled, backed into a corner with Jötnar advancing. Braced in anticipation of horrific pain and a warriors wound to take home, he saw realization flashing across his own eyes, faster than lightning, when he was not harmed by the deadly cold touch. When he (they) saw blue skin, something slotted into place even as his mind gibbered, crumbling into dust. Even before anyone else could realize what he had seen, he had moved, he is moving, he was moving away and forward, pushing through the shock and defending himself, saving himself the only way he had known how; lying, hiding. He wondered if it would not have been better to have died there, forsaken on Jotunheim, and Aesir.

 

_Loki didn’t like Jotunheim. It was cold._

 

It would have been. He can turn back time, and end it there, but there are consequences that he cannot accept without aforethought, and in the state he is in, he cannot think well enough. The Loki who had returned to Asgard was very different from the Loki who had left. He was more alone than before.

 

He had not known that possible.

 

He knows better now.

 

  
**Of Falling and Flying** (acceptance)

He is lost, and he can never return to Asgard. Jotunheim is not home. Muspelheim is not home. Niflheim could be a shelter, because Hel would take him in, but it will not be home. It cannot be. Hel is not home to anyone but the dead. When he dies, he will not go to Valhalla. Angrboda cannot take him in; it will bring too much notice upon her and their children.

 

He has no home to go to.

 

_Let’s go home, Brother._

 

In that moment, he is free; from all influences and considerations. He has no responsibilities tying him down, no consequences that he cannot choose to face. He is a leaf in the wind, a petal in the stream, weightless, light, and free. He understands what it meant when Angrboda said that freedom was just another word for having nothing left to lose. He understood that for the first time, he could take a step off a cliff, take _off_ , and never come back. He knew that if he didn’t like where he landed, he’d be able to leave, and keep leaving, until he found somewhere he did like. And if he never did, he wouldn’t be forced to settle for settling. He is the _Skywalker_ , the _Silvertongue_ , and the God of _Chaos_. But he didn’t need to be.

 

He could choose to be Bela, or Nox, or Trell. He could choose to be male, or female, dark or light, short or tall. He no longer needed to be Loki, and it is a devastating loss even as it is an incredible blessing. It is a newfound freedom that he wants to utilize, while he can. So as he heals, he pushes, with his thoughts, the body he wants to inhabit. While bones heal, he directs their size. While muscles grow, he directs their shape. While skin forms, he directs its tone, and its texture. It is an imprecise magic, but one he is practiced in. It is no different to lie with your looks, than it is to lie with your tongue, and Loki has always been a liar in more ways than one.

 

_“Loki, in the All-Father’s name! Don’t you see that dressing as a woman is dishonorable!”_

_“I am not dressed as a woman, Thor. I_ am _a woman, today”_

 

When he is done and healed, after what feels like several hours, he looks completely different from Loki. He feels like a new person. And it’s fantastic. He’s still exhausted, and as weak as a newborn foal. If he was attacked, he’d have no chance of surviving. But at the same time, he feels reborn, and renewed.

 

It won’t be easy. He’ll have to find somewhere to go, to find shelter and sustenance. It will be even more difficult, considering he doesn’t know where he is. And it won’t help that he can’t rely on his title or status. He has neither funds, nor standing. No one will take him on his word at anything, because no one knows the person he is pretending to be. It will be a challenge.

 

_I’ve always loved a challenge, Brother._

 

And suddenly, his blood is rushing through his veins. His heart is pounding inside his ribcage, and there’s a roaring in his ears. He feels the flush of energy, that once someone would have called a berserkers rage. But he is not angry. He’s excited. He’s trembling with it, with anticipation to just get up and go. It’s going to be a new adventure, and suddenly it’s easy to put one foot in front of the other, to put all the previous thoughts out of his head. It’s easy to forget that he failed to meet the expectations for Loki, when there are no expectations for the person he is now, so he cannot fail.

 

And if there are no expectations, he can set his own, and exceed them every time. His own expectations were bound to be higher than anyone else’s, and more in line with who he wanted to be. He’d feel more accomplished for having met his own expectations than he would feel if he had met Odin’s expectations, or his mothers’, or his brothers’.

 

He had expected to die when he landed. He had expected that his letting go would result in no further consequence except his death, which he had almost guaranteed the moment he slayed Laufey.

 

_Traitor!_

 

The fact that he was alive was a gift. He had no desire to go back to Asgard.

 

_Come home, Brother._

 

So he would go forward. A new life, new challenges, new friends. An adventure, in which he would not have to follow his brother, and get him out of risky situations. An adventure in which he could forge his own path. It sounded like the most exciting thing he had ever done.

 

And if he died, there would be no one to mourn him. That was alright. No one would have mourned him if he’d died in Asgard. At least this way, he’d be doing things on his own terms. He had fallen, and it had been his punishment. He had done his time, and paid his dues.

 

He had fallen from a great height, and lost everything he had ever known. Now, he was free to fly.

 


End file.
